CHAPTER V. V. Lyndhurst as Chancellor under Lord Grey. LORD CHIEF BARON. JANUARY, 1831-NOVEMBER, 1834. CHAP. LYNDHURST, who had already been Chancellor under three successive premiers holding very opposite opinions, was not A.D. 1830. without hopes that he might have continued to hold his Intrigue for office under a fourth, and he would have been very ready continuing to coalesce with the new Whig Government, pleading as his excuse that it was to comprise his old chief Lord Goderich, now Earl of Ripon, the Duke of Richmond, who had been a conspicuous Tory, and the once Tory Lord Palmerston, with other associates of Canning. Strange to say, Lord Grey was by no means disinclined to this arrangement. He expressed high respect for the talents of the Duke of Wellington's Chancellor-particularly as displayed in his exposition of the Regency Bill, which was still pending in the House, and which "it was desirable that he should carry through." This bill Lord Lyndhurst had introduced in the House of Lords the very same night in which the disastrous division had taken place in the House of Commons on the Civil List. The object of it was to make the Duchess of Kent Regent in case William IV. should die before the Princess Victoria, then heir presumptive to the crown, and only twelve years old, should have completed her eighteenth year. Nov. 15. In laying it on the table the Chancellor certainly did take a most masterly view of the constitutional law upon the subject,-illustrated by very interesting allusions to what had been done in this and other countries on similar occasions. He likewise alluded, with much delicacy, to the contingency of the Queen being enceinte at the death of the King, and giving birth to a child after the Princess Victoria should be placed upon the throne. However, there was little difference of opinion as to the fitness of the CHAP. Seal. V. measure; and it might easily have been carried through its subsequent stages, even if it had been opposed by its versatile author. Lord Grey's real motive, I believe, was, that he A.D. 1830. might avoid handing over the Great Seal to Brougham, of whose temerity and insubordination he had a most distressing anticipation. Some alleged that, not insensible in old age to the influence of female charms, the venerable Whig Earl had been captivated by the beauty and lively manners of Lady Lyndhurst, and that her bright eyes were new arguments shot against a transfer of the Great Seal. However Brougham insists upon this may be, it is certain that he offered Brougham the office and obtains of Attorney General, meaning to soften the proposal with an the Great enumeration of some of the illustrious men who had held the office, and a representation of the importance to the new Government that the newly elected member for the county of York should remain in the House of Commons. But Brougham burst away from Lord Grey with indignation; and, this being the very day fixed, by a notice which he had Nov. 17. given in the House of Commons before the Duke of Wellington's resignation, for his motion on parliamentary reform, he hurried down to St. Stephen's with the determination of immediately bringing it on. As such a step would have destroyed the new Government while yet in embryo, he was earnestly entreated to desist from his purpose; and he yielded, but making use of language which clearly indicated that he would only consent to become a supporter of Lord Grey's administration on his own terms: "I beg it to be understood that what I do, I do in deference to the wishes of the House. And farther, as no change that can take place in the administration can by any possibility affect me, I beg to be understood that, in putting off the motion, I will put it off until the 25th of this month and no longer. I will then, and at no more distant period, bring forward the question of parliamentary reform, whatever may be the condition of circumstances, and whosoever may be his Majesty's Ministers." * I know not if Lord Grey exclaimed, as I once heard him do upon a similar "flare up" of the same person, "The fat is * Hansard, i. 562. Henceforth the 3rd series of Hansard is to be understood as quoted. CHAP. Nov. 22. all in the fire;" but he instantly renounced all notion of Lyndhurst being his Chancellor, and before "the 25th of the A.D. 1830. month," when the question of Parliamentary Reform was without fail to have been brought forward in the House of Commons by the honourable member for the county of York, "whosoever might be his Majesty's Ministers," the Right Honourable Henry Lord Brougham and Vaux took his seat on the woolsack in the House of Lords. Lyndhurst becomes Lord Chief Baron of the Court of Exchequer. Still, the object of attaching the Tory ex-Chancellor to the Whig Government was by no means abandoned. He was asked by the new Premier to continue to take charge of the Regency Bill, with many compliments to his eloquence and ability, which were very complacently received. A scheme was soon after devised and carried out, which it was thought would take off all danger of Lyndhurst's active opposition, if he should not be quite contented with his new position. Alexander, the Chief Baron of the Exchequer, was asked to resign. He was willing to do so on condition of having a peerage, to which he had no just pretension. This would have caused some scandal; and a hint was thrown out to Alexander, by a friend of the new Government, that some notice was threatened in the House of Commons of his unfitness to continue on the bench by reason of his age and infirmities. Alexander thereupon agreed to resign unconditionally; and his office was offered to Lyndhurst. Hitherto there never had been an instance of a Lord Chancellor or Lord Keeper, after resigning the Great Seal, becoming a common law Judge; but there was no objection to it in point of law, nor would the supposed breach of etiquette be blamed by any one whose opinion was worth regarding. Lyndhurst had sufficient confidence in his own powers to support his dignity; and the offer of a place for life, with a salary of 70007. a year, was very tempting to him, for, although he could contrive to prevent executions being put into his house, he was exceedingly poor, and the retired allowance for a Chancellor was then only 40007. a year,-an income quite inadequate to support Lady Lyndhurst's fashionable establishment. Accordingly, on the first day of Hilary Term, 1831, the ex-Chancellor took his seat on the Bench CHAP. V. as Chief Baron of the Court of Exchequer. I ought to state that, accepting this office, he gave no pledge whatever to support Lord Grey's government. No doubt great disap- A.D. 1831. pointment was felt when he suddenly became the leader of the Opposition in the House of Lords; but in all the bitter struggles that followed, and amidst the many provocations he gave by the violent and unfair means he resorted to for the purpose of defeating the measures of the Whigs, I never heard, either in public or private, any taunt thrown out against him on the supposition that the course he took was contrary to good faith. He continued to preside in the Court of Exchequer four years, again showing that, if he had liked, he might have earned the very highest reputation for judicial excellence. I did not regularly practise before him, but I often went into his court, particularly in revenue causes, after I became a law officer of the Crown, and as often I admired his wonderful quickness of apprehension, his forcible and logical reasoning, his skilful commixture of sound law and common sense, and his clear, convincing, and dignified judgments. He was a great favourite with the bar on account of his general courtesy, although he has told me that he acted upon the principle that "it is the duty of a Judge to make it disagreeable to counsel to talk nonsense." He regularly went circuits, saying that "he thought it pleasanter to try larcenies and highway robberies than to listen to seven Chancery lawyers on the same side upon exceptions to the Master's report." He declared that he was even pleased with what Judges generally find intolerable-the duty of receiving the country gentlemen at dinner, when the labours of the day are supposed to be over; but he averred that he not only could make himself entertaining to them, but that he could make them entertaining to himself in return. Still he would not heartily give his mind to his judicial business. His opinion was, and is, of small weight in Westminster Hall; and I do not recollect any case being decided on any judgment or dictum of his. It was only while he was in court that he cared for or thought of the causes he had to dispose of. The rest of his time he spent His high qualities as a common law Judge. CHAP. in attending the debates of the House of Lords, or in forming cabals with his political partisans, or at the festal board. A.D. 1831. He had for a puisne Bayley, who, having been a Judge of the King's Bench, had come into the Exchequer, from being tired of Lord Tenterden. On this learned and laborious coadjutor Lyndhurst relied entirely. The pure law so supplied he knew how to extract from the quartz in which it was mixed up, and to exhibit as if he himself had dug it up resplendent from the mine, or had long held it in his private purse. Query whether any exception to his impartiality? His wonder ful power of memory exhibited in the case of Small v. Attwood. I never suspected him of partiality, except on the trial of a cause of Dicas v. Lord Brougham. This was an unfounded action for false imprisonment, brought by a blackguard attorney against Lord Chancellor Brougham, at a time when there was a great enmity (followed by a strict friendship) between the noble defendant and the judge. I must say I thought the latter on this occasion showed a strong inclination to push his rival into a scrape; but, if this inclination actually existed, it might have proceeded from a love of fun, rather than from rancour or malice. I myself was sued by the same attorney, in the Court of Exchequer, for defamation in my speech against him as counsel for the defendant in this very cause, and I must confess I was rather uneasy at the thought of my trial coming on before the Lord Chief Baron, as I dreaded lest, to have a laugh against me, he might leave this question to the jury in such a way as to induce them to find a verdict against me. Luckily my antagonist had not the courage to proceed to trial, and at last I had "judgment against him as in case of a nonsuit." In the time of Lord Chief Baron Lyndhurst the Exchequer was a court of equity as well as a court of law; but the equity business was disposed of by a single judge, and, caring little about it, the Chief Baron generally handed it over to Mr. Baron Alderson. One equity case, however, he was required to hear on account of its magnitude (Small v. Attwood), and it turned out heavier (in legal phrase) than any case ever tried in England; for the hearing, from first to last, occupied a greater number of hours than the trial of Mr. Hastings. It arose out of a contract for the sale of iron-mines in the county |